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2005-03-28 23:01

Ronski
Account closed

Registered: Mar 2005
Posts: 9

The legendary Ronski/FBR 2001 sends greetings to you mere mortals...

I've descended from the heaven of eliteness to be amongst you mere mortals. Boy have times changed since we officially retired the Commodore 64. FBR owned the 64 and as such, we rightfully retired it when we retired late 1989.

I'm happy to see emulators and demo/intro archives in existence today! You guys are coding some really cool stuff nowadays and it's good to know that coders are still rocking with the C64. We won't punish you for continuing to code on the 64 after we retired it ;-)

For all the guys from the early days, get in touch with me! I spoke with Kickback recently and we talked about the good old days. I still talk to Rabdoe frequently but I've lost contact with the other elite dudes.

I'm back to the heavens now in that immortal world of eliteness. Consider yourself blessed to have read text from the infamous Ronski/FBR 2001.

WE OWN(ED) THE 64!

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2005-03-30 05:38

Wanderer
Account closed

Registered: Apr 2003
Posts: 478

Quote: The almighty "Death Demon"! I humbly bow before your greatness with infinite respect...

I lost contact with everyone from FBR. I'm hoping that someone will stumble across this website as I did.

I don't think these people truly understand the power and magnificence of having you here! Back in the days of True C64 glory, 99.9% of these people would not be allowed access to the "Elite" BBS's (Jimmy Z's board, etc). They would have to reach elite status in order to be in the presence of the God's. Many tried but few succeeded. With the advent of the Internet, anyone can find anything on coding, rasters, example code, etc. and joining a site is easy as supplying a valid email address.

That is why I say they don't truly understand the power and magnificence of having true C64 elites in their presence. Still, 20 years later, when you hear the handle "Death Demon", you think of C64. That's one hell of an accomplishment!

Respectfully yours,

Ronski/FBR 2001

Ronski, even though I know you as a friend, I think you're going overboard a little. Gods? Elite?

Even without the internet, I disagree that 99.9% of the people wouldn't be here today. I didn't use the internet to get where I am today on the 64, and I don't know of many others who did either.

The 64 scene was not static. It changed and evolved over time. New people came to the scene and with them came new imports. New programmers came to the scene and with them came new intros and demos. New sysops came to the scene and with them came new boards people could join.

There may have been a point in time where being on Jimmy Z's board was something only attainable by the high and mighty, but eventually the groups were a dime a dozen. He had many people from many different groups on there.

I can remember a time where I used to see these FBR imports and think, wow!!! I could never do that stuff... these guys are amazing. One day I found myself in FBR :), I sat down with some books and set about to make those dreams come true to learn to code.

Over the years many of those kids made their dreams come true. The Forbes top richest men in the world are elite, 16 year old kids with modems were never ever elite. 16 year old kids were just that, kids with computers who would get games from overseas and slap on an intro. Sysops would keep the no-names off the boards. I hardly think that this deserves the title of 'elite'. Even with all the releases I put out, I don't consider myself as 'elite'. I had skills but it wasn't any God like status.

You either did it or you didn't. I don't consider my mechanic elite because he can change my head gasket and I cannot. I don't consider my hairstylist elite because she can cut my hair in a way that I cannot. So a kid on a computer, I would never call elite.

There were only the beginners, those who first did it on the 64 in North America. Death Demon was one of the first when it came to intros in USA. Who didn't know who FBR was?

But that was then... times changed... groups did come along and are still coming along.

The 64 was meant to evolve...

2005-03-30 06:00

Ronski
Account closed

Registered: Mar 2005
Posts: 9

Quote: Ronski, even though I know you as a friend, I think you're going overboard a little. Gods? Elite?

Even without the internet, I disagree that 99.9% of the people wouldn't be here today. I didn't use the internet to get where I am today on the 64, and I don't know of many others who did either.

The 64 scene was not static. It changed and evolved over time. New people came to the scene and with them came new imports. New programmers came to the scene and with them came new intros and demos. New sysops came to the scene and with them came new boards people could join.

There may have been a point in time where being on Jimmy Z's board was something only attainable by the high and mighty, but eventually the groups were a dime a dozen. He had many people from many different groups on there.

I can remember a time where I used to see these FBR imports and think, wow!!! I could never do that stuff... these guys are amazing. One day I found myself in FBR :), I sat down with some books and set about to make those dreams come true to learn to code.

Over the years many of those kids made their dreams come true. The Forbes top richest men in the world are elite, 16 year old kids with modems were never ever elite. 16 year old kids were just that, kids with computers who would get games from overseas and slap on an intro. Sysops would keep the no-names off the boards. I hardly think that this deserves the title of 'elite'. Even with all the releases I put out, I don't consider myself as 'elite'. I had skills but it wasn't any God like status.

You either did it or you didn't. I don't consider my mechanic elite because he can change my head gasket and I cannot. I don't consider my hairstylist elite because she can cut my hair in a way that I cannot. So a kid on a computer, I would never call elite.

There were only the beginners, those who first did it on the 64 in North America. Death Demon was one of the first when it came to intros in USA. Who didn't know who FBR was?

But that was then... times changed... groups did come along and are still coming along.

The 64 was meant to evolve...

Come on Mikey...You were unique because of your talent but in the grand scheme of things, what I said is 100% true. Yes, I do agree that things have evolved after we retired the 64 back in 1990 and I'm ass-u-me(ing) that many of the modern code has piggy backed code/algorithms from the PC and other platforms. I'm also assuming there's some type of code that converts or translates PC code (C or ASM) to 6510 instruction set code. I may be wrong but that's what my gut is telling me.

Now back to eliteness...Money was NOT important to us so comparing Forbes to what we were doing is like comparing apples to playing cards. We didn't do it for the money, we did it "because". If there was a Forbes for the C64 you better believe we would have made the list.

Yes, there may have been many groups but guess what? THEY DIDN'T MATTER! You still have the same attitude that you had almost 20 years ago and I respect that. I too still have the same attitude and that is to be respected as well.

As you said, "I look back and I really don't think there's much to be praised about being given access to a BBS. In the larger scale of things in life... it's rather silly to be boasting about it :)". The larger scale of things in life was the C64, nothing else mattered!

We cut school in order to get zero day warez released. We defrauded phone companies in order to make phone calls all over the globe just to get zero day imports. We had people tie up BBS phone lines in order to be the first ones to get our zero day warez on the boards. We had BBS phone lines DISCONNECTED to guarantee that we released warez first. We even bought games in the USA and had them before stores got them! We did what we had to do in order to be the BEST and guess what, we did it for the love of it, not for the money. Whatever it took, that's what we did and that's what made us the BEST!

Like you said, there were many groups but they didn't do whatever it took to be the best. And for that, they didn't matter. We can agree to disagree agreeably Mike but like I said before, we were ELITE. Remember it and be proud of the fact that you were "on top" during this time. Tell this story to your kids and grand kids. We helped mold the future of computing and FBR officially retired the Commodore 64 in 1990. We understood evolution and knew that it was time for "everyone" to evolve and move to the next level, 16 bit programming. The natural evolutionary path was then 32 bit programming and now 64 bit programming. Don't try to impress me with 8 bit "new routines". Impress me by taking 64 bit and pushing it "beyond the envelope" like we did with the Commodore 64.

Nuff said.

Ronski/FBR 2001

2005-03-30 06:22

Wanderer
Account closed

Registered: Apr 2003
Posts: 478

>Come on Mikey...You were unique because of your talent but
>in the grand scheme of things

Thanks :)

>Now back to eliteness...Money was NOT important to us so
>comparing Forbes to what we were doing is like comparing
>apples to playing cards. We didn't do it for the money, we

In the eyes of a 16 year old teenager, being in a group might be considered 'elite' in that mindset. However even as a teenager I was all too aware of what I was doing. It was just a computer and nothing more. Programming an intro on the 8 bit machine was great, but when you stepped outside the bedroom, it meant nothing (to me anyway). I guess thats why I always remained without an ego, when others got swelled heads (I'm not implying anybody in particular, honest).

>Yes, there may have been many groups but guess what? THEY
>DIDN'T MATTER! You still have the same attitude that you
>had almost 20 years ago and I respect that.

OF course they mattered. They did what anybody else was doing with a group that consisted of two or three initials. You can't just say FBR rocked the world, because they didn't.

Other groups came along... and yes, FBR was one of the beginners on the 'scene'. Going back to my argument on Driven's website... they may have been the first to do something for the first time but others did come along. You can say, Elvis invented rock and roll, Black Sabbath invented heavy metal, Led Zeppelin invented... etc. but you don't worship the ground they walk upon. Other groups come along and gain notoriety.

>The larger scale of things in life was the C64, nothing
>else mattered!

Hell yes.... friends, socializing, going to parties, girlfriends. I was well aware that my name was known all over the world, but I never spoke about what I did as a programmer when I left the house.

>Like you said, there were many groups but they didn't do
>whatever it took to be the best.

This is where you and I disagree. They did the same thing that we did. Their skills were nothing better than ours. So one group had more contacts overseas and were exclusive... and the kid who imported used his modem to download the releases.

>Remember it and be proud of the fact that you were "on
>top" during this time. Tell this story to your kids and
>grand kids. We helped mold the future of computing and FBR
>officially retired the Commodore 64 in 1990.

lol, okay now that is going a little too far. FBR retired the 64? FBR may have paved the way on the 64 for imports and intros, and you may be proud of being in FBR at one time (and sure it's something to be proud about) but to say they officially retired the 64 or "owned" the 64, is laughable. No disrespect to FBR but nobody owned the machine and the 64 is still seeing releases to this day (which is another debate entirely).

>We understood evolution and knew that it was time
>for "everyone" to evolve and move to the next level,

Okay but Ron, understand this. FBR was not the be all and end all of programming. They did not come along in one fell swoop, and dominate the 64. Many other groups came during their time, and some surpassed them. And when FBR left the 64, the 64 did not die. FBR was not the life blood of the 64. They were just ONE group of many groups. You're making it sound like the only time the 64 was alive in USA was when FBR was around. That is not true at all.

Some people left for greener pastures, others remained. But when FBR left, many other people were still around to keep breathing life into it. :)

I think you are blowing this a little out of proportion.

2005-03-30 06:50

Ronski
Account closed

Registered: Mar 2005
Posts: 9

Like I said Mike, I respect you and you haven't changed your views in over 20 years. I can honestly say that I remember us having this conversation on the phone back then and your views were still the same :-)

The fact of the matter is, time has changed and that time is no longer with us, only the memories. And if I could do it again I would say, "Hell yeah! Bring it on!!!"

I'm married now, two kids and those days are WAAAAY behind me. Yes, I went to the Amiga and then to the IBM and kicked ass on those platforms as well. I continued programming and went "mainstream" when others went into programming games. I did damn good over the years as well and my six digit salary reflected that. I don't program nowadays for corporate America anymore, only for myself when working on code that I can't trust to my staff for security purposes. I wrote the feature article for the Java Report a few years ago that detailed the internals of the Java Virtual Machine. I developed an MFC class telephony API in C++ that I sold to Microsoft and receive royalties to this day. I left the employee role and formed two companies several years ago. I'm 33 now and I own my home free and clear without a mortgage. I made my first million at the age of 29 and I owe it all to the world of Commodore 64. That was the platform that changed my life and made it possible for me to begin programming on an 8 bit platform and then to programming distributed systems on 64 bit platforms.

It was a pleasure communicating to you again my friend and I wish the best for you and yours moving forward.

Ronski/FBR 2001

2005-03-30 07:45

Trash

Registered: Jan 2002
Posts: 122

Quote: Like I said Mike, I respect you and you haven't changed your views in over 20 years. I can honestly say that I remember us having this conversation on the phone back then and your views were still the same :-)

The fact of the matter is, time has changed and that time is no longer with us, only the memories. And if I could do it again I would say, "Hell yeah! Bring it on!!!"

I'm married now, two kids and those days are WAAAAY behind me. Yes, I went to the Amiga and then to the IBM and kicked ass on those platforms as well. I continued programming and went "mainstream" when others went into programming games. I did damn good over the years as well and my six digit salary reflected that. I don't program nowadays for corporate America anymore, only for myself when working on code that I can't trust to my staff for security purposes. I wrote the feature article for the Java Report a few years ago that detailed the internals of the Java Virtual Machine. I developed an MFC class telephony API in C++ that I sold to Microsoft and receive royalties to this day. I left the employee role and formed two companies several years ago. I'm 33 now and I own my home free and clear without a mortgage. I made my first million at the age of 29 and I owe it all to the world of Commodore 64. That was the platform that changed my life and made it possible for me to begin programming on an 8 bit platform and then to programming distributed systems on 64 bit platforms.

It was a pleasure communicating to you again my friend and I wish the best for you and yours moving forward.

Ronski/FBR 2001

By showing off your salary and your need to brag about your financial situation you are an idiot by european standards. We simply let our work talk for itself, I guess that you wouldn't be more than a mediocre member of the community if we could see what you actually performed. Me myself doesn't want to be more than I am, but this doesn't stop me from knowing that if I wanted and had the time I could be more than I shown off here.

BTW I'm happy for you that you have had some use of your experience from the c-64 but please stay at that if you don't plan to contribute.

2005-03-30 18:25

Sh0ckTr00per

Registered: Jan 2003
Posts: 7

>With the advent of the Internet, anyone can find anything >on coding, rasters, example code, etc. and joining a site >is easy as supplying a valid email address.

>That is why I say they don't truly understand the power >and magnificence of having true C64 elites in their >presence.

Hahaha! 20 years of elitism and a six digit salary and what does it get you? A newbie scene moron like me posting in your thread.. LMFSO..

2005-03-31 09:43

Burglar

Registered: Dec 2004
Posts: 1085

Quote: >With the advent of the Internet, anyone can find anything >on coding, rasters, example code, etc. and joining a site >is easy as supplying a valid email address.

>That is why I say they don't truly understand the power >and magnificence of having true C64 elites in their >presence.

Hahaha! 20 years of elitism and a six digit salary and what does it get you? A newbie scene moron like me posting in your thread.. LMFSO..

So Ronski, I'm wondering if you're a megalomaniac in real life aswell, or do you just play one on tv?

Burglar/SCS*TRC
Spankerz Heaven - https://sh.scs-trc.net/

2005-04-01 15:20

drake
Account closed

Registered: Dec 2002
Posts: 207

starz and springled banner.... hail to the americans and their passion for their 6 digit salary.

don't judge to hard...it's HIS life ;-)

-2 start press any key..where is the any key?-

2005-04-01 15:49

TDJ

Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 1879

Quote: starz and springled banner.... hail to the americans and their passion for their 6 digit salary.

don't judge to hard...it's HIS life ;-)

-2 start press any key..where is the any key?-

Better yet: it's his world, we're just living in it.

2005-04-01 17:36

Scout

Registered: Dec 2002
Posts: 1570

Quote: Better yet: it's his world, we're just living in it.

And that's what I call a cool import =)

R.

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